


snowfall

by norasunset



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Hurt/Comfort, Young Royai, bby royai goes ice skating!, country riza :)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-22
Updated: 2021-01-22
Packaged: 2021-03-13 22:09:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,490
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28910631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/norasunset/pseuds/norasunset
Summary: Roy suggests going ice skating to an otherwise disinterested Riza. Chaos ensues.based off a prompt: “person A falling through the ice into a freezing cold pond/lake and Person B rescuing them”
Relationships: Riza Hawkeye & Roy Mustang, Riza Hawkeye/Roy Mustang
Comments: 6
Kudos: 25





	snowfall

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! This is my first time writing royai—I’ve loved them for quite a while, but I only just now found the guts to attempt writing anything with them. It’s entirely possible that there are historical and/or canon inaccuracies, I had trouble finding the exact year Roy went to study with Berthold Hawkeye? Regardless—feel free to let me know if there’s anything else I slipped up on. 
> 
> Anyways, hope you enjoy!

The kitchen had been perfectly quiet before he’d walked in, she thinks. 

“Do you know how to ice skate, Miss Hawkeye?" 

Riza looks up from the potatoes she'd been peeling. "What?" 

"The lake behind the house is frozen. Haven't you noticed?" 

She _had_ noticed, but the lake and its frozen status hadn't exactly been at the top of her priorities. So she chooses to nod by way of answering, the scraps of potato skin falling into the sink continuously.

"Well, it'd be perfect for ice skating, I think. Don't you? Unless you don't know how," Roy says, grinning slightly. 

"I know how," Riza replies immediately, her gaze never leaving the sink. "But I'm afraid I'm busy today." It's an answer she would've given regardless of her to-do list for the day. 

Sixteen year old Roy Mustang has been living in the Hawkeye household for four months now, but Riza still feels like they're stepping on eggshells around each other. It's weird, after all; she's been an only child, the sole focus of her father's attention (aside from his alchemy, of course) for her entire life—and now she's sharing her meals, her father, her _home_ —with this peculiar older boy. 

It isn't as if he's been rude or anything of the sort—rather, Roy Mustang is a perfectly charming young man. He's never spoken to Riza with anything less than the utmost respect and politeness. Still—there has yet to be any kind of moment where Riza has felt like this is something she's completely okay with, like the person living in her house is more than a stranger. 

She's peeled the whole potato by now, so she picks up another clean one and starts again. "Besides," she starts, "don't you have a lesson later?" 

Riza can see Roy shaking his head out of the corner of her eye. "Master Hawkeye said he wanted to rest today, so we're not doing any alchemy until tomorrow. Come on, I found some skates in the shed out back. It won't be any fun by myself." 

She supposes that's true. She probably _could_ use a break from peeling, to be quite honest—her hands are starting to ache slightly. Riza turns her head towards Roy for the first time since he walked in. "Alright," she says, and his face lights up. 

~~~

Truthfully, it's been a long time since Riza has done anything like this. It takes her a while to remember how to keep her balance, so she mainly stays on the outskirts of the lake, where she can fall into the snow beside her if she needs to, until she feels comfortable enough to move ever so closer towards the middle of the ice. 

Roy, of course, is a natural at skating—just like everything else in his life. He moves around the edges of the frozen lake with ease, zipping by Riza and sticking his tongue out at her occasionally. 

Riza returns the gesture, but she doesn't feel any real malice towards him. She knows it's silliness. And besides, she begrudgingly admits—this _is_ fun. She's not moving nearly as quickly or effortlessly as Roy, but feeling herself glide along the ice, the wind tossing tufts of her hair from side to side, is something that brings a smile to her face before she even realizes it. 

"Be careful, Mr. Mustang," she chides as he passes her yet again. "Don't get too close to the middle. I don't know if it's safe." 

Roy turns around, skating backwards as easily as he walks. "What do you mean?" he calls back, cupping his hands around his mouth. "The whole lake's frozen solid. We're fine," he grins. 

Riza's not entirely sure. The animals she'd seen on the lake before they'd arrived (a deer, a few rabbits, and two squirrels) had stuck primarily to the edges—and she intended to do the same. Over the years, she'd observed that their instincts on things like this were usually right. 

Maybe she's overthinking this, though. Roy's been practically zooming all over the lake, and he hasn't faced an ounce of trouble. 

But it happens before she's even aware of it—literally in the blink of an eye. Roy's doing perfectly fine, skating across the center of the lake with his eyes closed, a content grin on his face that immediately shifts to one of horror when he hears the crack beneath him. He lets out a surprised shout of panic, and it's like the lake opens up and swallows him whole as the ice beneath his feet shatters, dropping him into the freezing water mercilessly. 

Riza skates over to him as fast as she can manage and dives in behind him without a second thought. He's flailing, unsure of which way is up or down until he sees her silhouette reaching out towards him. Riza grabs him underneath his _arms—okay, he's much heavier than she thought he'd be, even underwater, but there's no time to be worried about that now_ —and with a few determined kicks of her feet, she propels both of them back up to the water's surface. 

They both gasp for breath, but Riza doesn't have time to stop and collect her bearings just yet. She moves her grip on Roy from his armpits to his waist, and hauls him out of the water and onto the ice. 

"Can you walk?" she asks him, breathing hard as she props her elbows on the ice and pushes herself out of the freezing water. 

Roy's shivering is uncontrollable, but he manages to nod enough for her to understand. 

"Okay," Riza says. "Let's get back inside before my father wakes up." She wraps an arm around Roy for warmth as they half run, half walk back to the entrance of the house. 

She’s especially glad she’d started a fire in the hearth for drying the laundry earlier now. Riza grabs the first pair of clothes she recognizes as his from the drying line and tosses them at him once they’re in front of the fireplace. She stands there expectantly for a moment before she realizes Roy’s waiting for her to leave so he can change. “Oh,” she blurts out. “I...I’ll be right back.” 

Riza rushes up the stairs to her room, busying herself with peeling off her soaking wet clothes and jumping into new ones as quickly as she can, wrapping a blanket around herself as a final protector against the cold settling into her bones. She grabs another blanket before she heads back downstairs. 

Roy’s already changed and huddled in front of the fireplace by the time Riza sits beside his still-shivering form, offering the blanket without a word. He takes it, and she can see the gratitude in his eyes as he wraps himself up with it. 

They stay like that for a while, sitting in front of the fireplace silently, stoically, as if the cold had taken their words from them. The silence becomes unbearable after a few moments, though, and they turn to each other to break the silence at the same time. 

“I’m—” Roy starts. 

“You’re—” Riza says simultaneously. 

Both of them stop immediately, not wanting to interrupt the other. It’s a little awkward, but Roy gestures for her to continue—or at least, she thinks that’s what he’s saying with his hands wrapped in the blanket. 

Riza takes a deep breath. "You can't swim?" she asks him, her arms crossed across her chest. 

"...No," Roy admits sheepishly. 

Riza gives him a look. "You really are a city boy, huh. It's a miracle none of the broken ice cut you anywhere when you fell, you know." 

"I'm really sorry, Miss Hawkeye," he says from underneath the blanket. "But thank you for saving me. I owe you." 

Riza thinks about that as she stares into the fire. She'd held him to such a high standard this whole time—thinking he was some genius prodigy, someone who had come to study with her father to learn alchemy and make the nation, the _world,_ a better place—and she'd just had to save him from drowning in a lake. He really was just a teenage boy, only a few years older than her. A child, still. 

The thought makes her giggle, despite herself. 

Roy turns to look at her, a bemused expression on his face. "What's so funny, Miss Hawkeye?" 

She meets his gaze, a grin still on her lips, and Roy finds himself incredibly warm all of a sudden, despite the chill he'd been feeling up until now. 

"Riza," she says after a moment. "If you want...you can call me Riza, Mr. Mustang." 

"Roy," he replies immediately. 

"Roy," she softly repeats after him, as if trying out the name on her tongue. 

The sudden feeling of warmth Roy had felt before only amplifies. Perhaps it's the fire they're sitting in front of, he thinks. 

Yes, Roy reassures himself. It's the fire.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! This was just a silly little drabble, but feedback and concrit are always appreciated if ya feel like giving any :)


End file.
